


Nonage - Terrified

by cutsycat



Series: Dictionary.Com Word of the Day Drabbles [1453]
Category: NCIS
Genre: Angst, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-25
Updated: 2019-11-25
Packaged: 2021-02-26 00:20:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,302
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21554521
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cutsycat/pseuds/cutsycat
Summary: As a child, Tony was terrified of his father. While he's now an adult and outside of his father's grasp that doesn't mean he's outgrown his fear.
Series: Dictionary.Com Word of the Day Drabbles [1453]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/444514
Comments: 10
Kudos: 31
Collections: 2019 Gen Angst Week Challenge, The Writer's Guild Community





	Nonage - Terrified

**Author's Note:**

> Another dictionary.com word of the day drabble. This time from 04/23/2003 for the word [nonage](http://www.dictionary.com/wordoftheday/2003/04/23/nonage).
> 
> nonage[ non-ij, noh-nij ]  
> noun  
> the period of legal minority, or of an age below 21.  
> any period of immaturity.
> 
> This is for Day 1 of the Gen Angst Week challenge. Today's prompt is Terrified.

Tony hated when his father got like this. He flinched as another plate smashed into the wall. He wrapped his arms around his legs and tried to make himself into an even smaller ball.

He had no idea what had set his father off this time. It honestly seemed like anything could set his father off. Ever since his mother died, he’d been living in fear, wondering if today would be the day that Senior snapped.

While destructive, Tony knew that this wasn’t the worst Senior could dish out. When he was younger, he used to pray that someone would rescue him from this hell, but he’d long since given that up as a childish dream. Nowadays, he simply did his best to make himself invisible and avoid Senior’s wrath.

It wasn’t as hard as it sounded. Despite being near the roar of frustration, Tony hadn’t actually caused it. He thought that one of the servants had served Senior the wrong drink or something. He really hadn’t understand any of Senior’s yelling. 

Senior seemed content to forget that his son existed so long as Tony didn’t encroach on his presence. That suited Tony just fine. He couldn’t wait until he was out of his nonage and could legally live on his own. 

He was tired of being terrified for his life, tired of wondering if today would be the day that Senior would kill them all. He just wanted out. Unfortunately, there was no escape for him. 

That’s why when he heard the yelling start, Tony immediately found a small night stand to curl up under and wait until it was over. He knew this wasn’t normal. He knew the other kids at school had loving parents or at least neglectful parents that weren’t violent, but he couldn’t do anything about it.

Honestly, Tony wouldn’t be surprised if he woke up one day to Senior wringing his neck, literally. There wasn’t a day that went by that Tony didn’t wonder if it was going to be his last. He couldn’t count the number of servants that had been injured in one of Senior’s rampages and simply vanished never to be seen again. 

There was no inquiry. There was no investigation. They were just gone. Tony knew one day it would be his turn. His only hope was that it wouldn’t be today.

His heart was pounding through his chest. He tried to take a deep breath to calm it down, but in the silence that had descended now that Senior had stopped throwing things it sounded unnaturally loud. He gulped, swallowing and holding his breath, hoping that Senior wouldn’t notice him.

When he heard the feet turn to leave, he couldn’t stop the sigh of relief from escaping. When the steps paused, he froze. Had Senior heard him? Was he coming back?

Tony held his breath as the footsteps grew quieter as his father moved away from him. When he was pretty sure that Senior was too far away to hear him, Tony relaxed his muscles and slid to the floor. He made it through another day. 

He wished that he could say that living with his father grew easier, but honestly it never did. His father’s temper only seemed to grow worse as the years passed. There were respites, generally in the form of some new trollop that Senior was trying to impress enough to marry him. 

During those times, Tony was forced to play happy family. He was expected to be a good boy and act like he loved his father instead of being terrified of him. It wasn’t easy. He never knew when his father would turn on him during those times. 

Some of the step-mothers actually weren’t that bad. Tony remembered one who had beautiful red hair like a cascade of fire down her back. She recognized the fear in Tony’s eyes and always made sure to give him a hug and hide him before things got too bad. 

She was probably the only one besides the staff that showed Tony any affection. Most of the rest of the time he was either ignored, his preference, or physically abused. He heard the teachers whispering about him behind his back, but if they knew how bad things were they never stepped in.

By the time he made it to adult-hood, he was convinced that no one could ever be trusted. After a lifetime under his father’s thumb, there was no way he would ever be able to trust anyone ever again. He was too terrified of finding someone even worse than his father to dare risk faith in anyone.

He made a habit of moving from one job to another whenever he started to feel like he could actually trust someone. He would never let down his guard. No one could be trusted.

To make matters even worse, when he finally decided that maybe he could trust someone again… Well let’s just say it didn’t go well for him. He’d only been in Baltimore for 18 months, which was actually shorter than the previous two police stations he’d worked at.

He’d been a newbie at those stations and no one had wanted to be his friend. Baltimore was different. He’d immediately gotten paired up with Danny. They’d seemed to hit it off and Tony had been struggling to keep himself neutral.

He’d wanted to let go. He’d wanted to trust. He knew he needed to leave, that it wasn’t safe to trust, but he didn’t want to believe it. So he lowered his guard. He let Danny in.

Now, his heart was once again shattered across the pavement. Thanks to NCIS Special Agent Leroy Jethro Gibbs, Tony knew his partner was dirty. Truthfully, that part didn’t bother him as much as it probably should have given he was in law enforcement. No, what bothered him was that Danny had no problems leaving him holding the bag and trying to make Tony take the blame for the entire thing.

Tony hadn’t even known about the money laundering scheme, but somehow Danny had made it seem like he did. Even the police chief had been on Danny’s side. Tony couldn’t believe it. 

If he was still ten years old, Tony would have been shaking in his boots terrified that the cops were going to arrest him for a crime he didn’t commit. He wasn’t a child anymore, though, and instead of being terrified, he quit. He wasn’t going to be part of whatever game this was.

When Gibbs offered him a job, Tony didn’t know what to think. He knew he couldn’t trust Gibbs. He couldn’t trust anyone, but he’d already quit. Where else could he go? What else could he do?

He didn’t know, so he accepted Gibbs’ offer. He still couldn’t bring himself to trust Gibbs or anyone else, but somehow despite him keeping everyone at arms’ length, the other NCIS Agents made him part of their family. Or well he thought it was like family. 

It reminded him of those sappy Christmas movies where everyone cared about you and no one was out to get you. He’d always thought those things were a load of crap. No one had ever cared about Tony.

Now, though. Now, he couldn’t help wondering if he’d stumbled into the lead role in his own sappy Christmas movie. He still couldn’t trust it to last, but it was nice feeling like someone actually gave a damn whether he lived or died. That didn’t mean he was any less terrified of trusting them.

In fact, he was probably more terrified than he’d ever been. If these people betrayed him, it would hurt far more than even Senior’s abuse. He didn’t know how to save himself, however. He knew leaving would only make things worse.

**Author's Note:**

> The dictionary.com series has 1 story already written for it after this one, so I will be posting at least 1 more story before I stop posting again. I'm hoping to get more stories written before then, so that I don't stop posting for a while. Wish me luck! 
> 
> It's 2019 now and I have closed my 2018 Prompt collection, but fear not my 2019 Prompt Collection is now open [here](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/cutsycat_NCIS_Prompts_2019/profile). Just click the sign up link. ;) It will remain open until the beginning of 2020. I'm hoping to complete all the 2019 prompts by the end of 2020. Do not fear I have not forgotten about the 2018 prompts and will continue working through them. It's just easier for me to not get overwhelmed if I keep the prompts separated by the year they were given to me.
> 
> If you are not an ao3 member, you can prompt me [here](http://cutsycat.livejournal.com/50701.html). Please follow the same rules as are listed in the above link. However, because this is a handmade prompt form(that thinks it's a poll), it is considerably more limited than what ao3 provides, so please use the ao3 form if you're an ao3 member. Please note the name option is for a name that I can say this is for so that you know it's for you. Since this is for non ao3 members it won't be true gifts, but you will be mentioned in the notes. Please note if you have already voted in the poll and would like to request more stories you can just add a comment to the poll. Please include the name along with the prompt, so that I can appropriately gift the prompt to you.
> 
> For any authors that want to chat and/or are looking for a place where they can toss plot ideas around and get input from people, you can come join my discord server that is specifically geared towards writing/encouraging people to write and authors. The invite link is [here](https://discord.gg/HFvwpCq). If you're not an author, but want to chat with me about writing/stories or anything else you are welcome to join. I reserve the right to boot you from my server if all you do is pester me about updates, however. *grin* Really anyone who wants to talk about writing and/or plot ideas for various stories is welcome to join. 
> 
> Also, Drakonyashka has translated a couple of my works into Russian. [Tutelage](http://archiveofourown.org/works/12378780) and [Imbue](http://archiveofourown.org/works/12378840). Go support them. 


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